Tag: knife

EXAIR commonly works with plastic injection molding companies. They produce top quality plastic parts from both commodity and engineering-grade resins for many diverse industries. The customer reached out to us with a problem. A mold that they were running was having some issues. The parts were not releasing and ejecting properly, causing the need to use a mold release, which was slowing down the process by a manual operation to the process. Also, the parts were seeing push pin marks, causing cosmetic issues with the parts. The customer wanted to explore using compressed air to blow the parts free.

Typical Plastic Injection Mold

Based on the mold size and layout, a pair of 12″ Super Air Knives was installed. The knives are oriented to blow straight down along the face of the mold, one knife per part tree. The strong laminar flow of air hits the parts causing them to release and drop without the use of release agents. Also, the push pin marks are within normal standards, eliminating the the cosmetic concerns.

This is just one example of how intelligently using compressed air can help improve a process. By using air knives for wide areas or using a 1″ Flat Super Air Nozzle for very small parts, or anywhere in between, we can help to solve your part ejection issues and make your process run better, faster, and with higher quality.

1″ Flat Super Air Nozzle with Changeable Shims

If you would like to talk about Super Air Knives, Flat Nozzles or any of the EXAIR Intelligent Compressed Air® Products, feel free to contact EXAIR and myself or one of our Application Engineers can help you determine the best solution.

Recently, I was working with a customer looking for a Premium Reversible Drum Vac and wanted it shipped to the Northwest Territories of Canada – which we could do! It got me to thinking, what are the farthest US state and territory locations EXAIR has shipped to in the North, South, West and East directions. I ‘scoured’ the records and came up with these.

Furthest North- We have shipped to Prudhoe Bay, Alaska. Most recently, believe it or not, we shipped a NEMA 4X Cabinet Cooler to an Oil and Natural Gas Exploration Company. Goes to show that even the coldest environments still have the need to provide cool, clean, dry air to cool and protect electronics in electrical enclosures.

Furthest South – We have shipped to the US Territory of Puerto Rico, city of Santa Isabel. An Aerospace company needed a strong, laminar blast of air and utilized a 6″ Stainless Steel Air Knife. An Air Knife offers a quiet, efficient way to clean, dry or cool parts, webs, or conveyors.

Furthest West- We have shipped to the US Territory of Guam. The local University ordered a model 1111-4 Super Air Nozzle Cluster, for a good strong blast of air flow for a cleaning operation. The model 1111-4 delivers 3.2 lbs of force, at just 82 dBA of sound. A safe and efficient nozzle for blowoff operations.

Furthest East- We have shipped to Eastport, Maine. The customer in Eastport ordered a Line Vac and a section of Conveyance Hose. The Line Vac is a great tool for conveying large volumes of material over long distances, through a standard hose or tube. The compact design features large throat diameters for maximum throughput capability.

It was interesting to look back and see all the places that EXAIR has shipped. We have customers from all over the globe. If you are outside the of 50 US States and Canada, we have a dedicated team of International Application Engineers that will work with you to select the best EXAIR product for your process and application, and direct you to your local International Distributor.

If you would like to talk about any of the EXAIR Intelligent Compressed Air® Products, feel free to contact EXAIR and myself or one of our Application Engineers can help you determine the best solution.

EXAIR manufactures the line of air knives known as the Super Air Knife. We pride ourselves on the wide array of material types and lengths that we offer, all from stock.

The Super Air Knife is the latest generation of engineered air knife that dramatically reduces compressed air usage and noise when compared to other blowoffs. It is a very efficient way to clean, dry, or cool parts, webs, or conveyors. It delivers a sheet of laminar air flow across the entire length, with a smooth and consistent delivery of air.

In order meet process environments that may be hot or corrosive in nature, EXAIR offers the Super Air Knife in four standard materials. The materials for stock air knives are aluminum, Type 303 stainless steel, Type 316 stainless steel, and PVDF (Polyvinylidene Fluoride.) Aluminum is well suited for a wide variety of environments where corrosion or contamination is not a factor. Type 303 stainless steel is a very common grade of stainless steel, and is good for mildly corrosive environments up to 400 °F. Type 316 stainless steel offers excellent corrosion resistance, better strength properties, and resists pitting. It can handle temperatures up to 800°F. Lastly, the PVDF air knives offer many benefits including resistance to UV light, inorganic chemicals, solvents, ozone, acids, weak bases and salts and can withstand temperatures up to 275°F. If there is a certain material required, EXAIR can also do custom Super Air Knives and have done them in PVC and other plastics. Check out this write up about a very unique custom material Super Air Knife that we made.

Not only is there a wide offering of materials of construction to meet the process needs, the Super Air Knives are available in many lengths to fit into the space available. From stock, we offer Super Air Knives in these lengths-

If a special length knife is needed, or one longer than the 108″, the Super Air Knives can be coupled utilizing the stocked Air Knife Coupling Kit to join multiple air knives as needed. If space is an issue, and certain length that is not stocked is needed, just give us a call – we can manufacture them to your specifications, to the exact length that you need. It takes just a few days and then the Super Air Knife of exactly the proper length will be on its way.

If you have questions about the Super Air Knives, or would like to talk about any of the EXAIR Intelligent Compressed Air® Products, feel free to contact EXAIR and myself or one of our Application Engineers can help you determine the best solution.

There are many ways to blowoff, cool, and/or dry materials. A few of these methods are the drilled pipe, an array of flat nozzles, using a blower driven air knife and the EXAIR Super Air Knife. We’ll examine each in further detail, for blowoff of water after a bottling cleaning operation. Testing was done at 60 PSIG of supply pressure. The blower utilized a 10 hp motor and was a centrifugal type spinning at 18,000 RPM. Sound levels were taken with product not present to test the sound of each of the blowoff types.

Drilled pipe is a common blowoff because it is very inexpensive and easy to make. But drilled pipe performs poorly. The low cost to make the drilled pipe is quickly outpaced by the inefficiency and high compressed air costs. The holes are easily blocked and the noise level is excessive, both of which violate OSHA requirements. Also, the air pattern across the length can be very inconsistent, with areas of low flow and areas of turbulent flow.

Flat air nozzles installed along a length of pipe is another inexpensive option, but it can be a poor performer. The flat nozzles are available in many materials, from many manufacturers. The flat nozzles do offer some efficiencies, but similar to drilled pipe, the operating costs and noise levels are high. Air pattern across the length can be inconsistent with areas of high and low flows, leading to incomplete drying or cooling. Also, many of these nozzles are made from plastic material which breaks or cracks when it it hit which causes additional expense and maintenance to replace broken nozzles.

A blower air knife can prove to be an expensive and noisy option. Typically, the initial purchase price is high. Operating costs are lower than the drilled pipe and flat nozzles and in line with the Super Air Knives. The blowers can be very large and space for two 3″ diameter hoses requires extra mounting space compared to low profile other options. Noise levels are high, at 90 dBA. Annual costs for bearing and filter maintenance can be significant.

EXAIR Super Air Knives performed exceptionally well in removing the water in one pass due to the strong, laminar flow of air. Sound level was low at just 69 dBA, well within OSHA requirements for an hour 8 hour exposure time. Safe operation is assured, as the Super Air Knife design cannot be dead-ended. Maintenance costs are low, as the Super Air Knife has no moving parts to breakdown or wear out.

** A pair of 12″ Super Air Knives was used for this comparison

Ultimately, the Super Air Knife is a low cost way to blowoff, dry, clean and cool.

If you have questions about Super Air Knives, or would like to talk about any EXAIR Intelligent Compressed Air® Product, feel free to contact EXAIR and myself or one of our Application Engineers can help you determine the best solution.

EXAIR will be giving away a free Soft Grip Safety Air Gun with the purchase of any EXAIR Super Air Knife from November 1st through December 31st, 2017. This special promotion will apply to all Super Air Knife orders, whether aluminum, stainless steel, or PVDF. Use the promotional model number during the promotional period and receive a free model 1210, a value of $81.00! The Soft Grip Safety Air Gun is a Top Pick, and provides the ideal combination of forceful flow, quiet noise level and low compressed air usage. To get the special promotional item, use the special part numbers as detailed in the link below.

The Super Air Knife is the latest generation of the EXAIR engineered air knives with dramatically reduced compressed air usage and noise compared to other types of blowoffs. The Super Air Knife is truly a more efficient tool for cleaning, drying or cooling parts, webs, or conveyors. The air flow is a uniform sheet of laminar air across the entire length with a hard-hitting force.

Replacing a noisy blowoff with a Super Air Knife results is a significant reduction in sound. Operation at a high pressure of 80 PSIG (5.5 Bar) leads to a sound level of just 69 dBA for most applications. Air amplification ratios (entrained air to compressed air) of 40:1 is produced. It also meets OSHA maximum dead-end pressure and noise requirements, for safe operation in the vicinity of plant personnel.

Typical applications for use include-

Post wash part drying

Sheet cleaning in strip mills

Conveyor cleaning

Part or component cooling

Web drying or cleaning

Environmental separation (air curtain)

Pre-paint blowoff and cleaning

Bag opening/filling operations

Scrap removal on converting operations

Take advantage of the Promotional Offering by clicking on the link at the top of the page. Qualified orders receive the free model 1210 Soft Grip Safety Air Guns as shown below.

FREE! EXAIR Model 1210 Soft Grip Safety Air Gun

If you have questions about Super Air Knives, Safety Air Guns, or would like to talk about any EXAIR Intelligent Compressed Air® Product, feel free to contact EXAIR and myself or one of our Application Engineers can help you determine the best solution.

That’s right folks, we’ve gone and done it again. When a customer calls for custom product because their environment calls for it or due to dimensional requirements, EXAIR has the ability and flexibility to meet those needs!

This time around it was a customer with specific material requirements due to their environment. I had a customer contact me recently that was using an aluminum Super Air Knife near a high voltage operation and was getting ground interference due to the aluminum air knife. They asked if it was possible to make them a custom knife out of PEEK plastic. After some light discussions about the form of the knife and what other materials are safe for their environment we settled on a 30% glass filled PEEK plastic for the knife, brass bolts and pipe plugs, with a PTFE shim installed. The form factor of the knife would follow the same shape as our PVDF Super Air Knives that are available from stock. The customer could not use PVDF due to high temperature and potential off-gassing in the process.

Whether you are looking for a one off product that is tailor made to your application or want to have a simple feature like hardware material changed in a stock EXAIR product that you are incorporating into thousands of machines, we have the solution for you.

EXAIR’s 15 extensive product lines solve problems in production processes everyday. From cooling to laser lens protection (as you will see below) to static elimination, general shop housecleaning, conveying and air conservation – we would like to help solve your problems.

Last week, I got an email from a customer. It was late in the day, and I was spent from a busy day. The customer was emailing for (2) reasons. First, they wanted to express their appreciation for our efforts several months ago regarding an application for a Vortex Tube. Over the course of a couple of weeks, we shared information and ideas back and forth regarding the Vortex Tube technology, how it works, and the various considerations when choosing the appropriate model. They ended up purchasing a unit and put it into operation. The application involved a plastic tubing cutting process and in this instance both the cold and hot air streams could be utilized to improve the process. The process involves heating up the material so it would lose its memory set, and then a cooling operation to improve the material cutting and handling. Below is an excerpt from the recent email:

The Vortex Tube takes in compressed air, and creates a Cold Stream and a Hot Air Stream

The second reason for the email was that he needed help with another application and based on the success of the initial collaboration, he knew he could trust in EXAIR to help find a solution that would work. The new application involves protecting a camera lens from debris created during a wire cutting laser process. The lens is getting hit with spatter and damage is starting to occur. Our collaboration has begun, and we are looking at the Super Air Knife and Flat Super Air Nozzle as possible solutions, each of them providing a strong air flow to direct the debris away from the lens.

2″ Flat Super Air Nozzle

To discuss your application and how an EXAIR Intelligent Compressed Air Products can help your process, feel free to contact EXAIR and one of our Application Engineers can help you determine the best solution.